Derrol Nail

Commentator, Office of Communications, NASA Kennedy Space Center

Derrol Nail is an award-winning NASA communicator and broadcaster who serves as a public affairs officer for NASA’s Moon Base Transportation Office at Kennedy Space Center. In this role, he communicates NASA’s work with industry to develop the transportation systems and capabilities needed to deliver science, technology, cargo and infrastructure to the lunar surface in support of a sustained human presence on the Moon.

Nail is best known as a launch commentator and host for some of NASA’s most prominent missions. He counted down the launches of Artemis I and Artemis II while communicating the real-time status of NASA’s Space Launch System rocket to audiences around the world. He also hosted NASA launch broadcasts for human spaceflight missions from Crew-3 through Crew-12.

His additional broadcast work includes missions that launched a rover toward Mars, sent NASA’s DART spacecraft hurtling toward an asteroid, and began the Psyche spacecraft’s journey to a unique metal-rich asteroid.

Nail is a two-time national Emmy Award winner, including recognition for NASA’s recent total solar eclipse broadcast, and has also received Gold and Silver Telly Awards. Before joining NASA, he spent approximately two decades as a television journalist and anchor. He is a graduate of the University of Florida’s College of Journalism and Communications.